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Abstract
Aboriginal and treaty rights are usually referred to as "collective rights", even though the western legal tradition strongly resists collective rights. However, several courts have also referred to aboriginal and treaty rights as individual rights. This thesis explores this tension and concludes that aboriginal and treaty rights are indeed collective rights that vest in Aboriginal collectives, despite the fact that very few other rights in Canadian law are collective rights in the true sense of the word. However, these collective rights also have an integral individual dimension and the courts have allowed individual rights to limit the rights of Aboriginal collectives in certain circumstances. Thus, the author concludes that the liberal-individualist perspective of Canadian courts will ultimately prevent them from recognizing aboriginal and treaty rights as collective rights for all purposes.
